**3. Materials and Methods**

#### *3.1. Study Area*

Jinan is located at the central and western parts of Shandong province, the southeastern edge of the North China Plain, the intersection of the low mountains and hills in the south of Shandong province and the alluvial plain in the northwest of Shandong province (Figure 2). It is close to Mount Tai in the south and straddles the Yellow River to the north. The terrain is high in the south and low in the north. The city has jurisdiction over 12 county-level administrative regions, including 10 municipal districts and 2 counties, with a total area of 10,244.45 km2. In 2020, the permanent resident population in Jinan was 9,202,432, the urbanization rate was 73.46%, and the GDP was 944.337 billion yuan. Due to the rapid advancement of urbanization and industrialization, as well as the accelerated transformation and development of the social economy, the disparity between population

size and land use in Jinan has increased, causing a series of problems including urban sprawl, declining quality of the ecological environment and air pollution. In April 2021, the State Council agreed in principle to the Implementation Plan for the Construction of the Starting Area for the Conversion of Old and New Growth Drivers in Jinan, which provided new development opportunities for Jinan and put forward higher requirements for rational land use and the optimization of territorial spatial patterns.

**Figure 2.** Map of study area.
